Understanding Society and Culture

• Human beings are social by nature, even introverts relate and communicate.

Culture

• Commonly divided into material and nonmaterial culture.
• Material culture includes attributes like clothing, tools, weapons, architectural design and religious implements.
• Nonmaterial culture constitutes belief systems, values, norms, shared languages, and symbols.

Norms and Values

• Norms are rules dictating what to do or not do in certain situations.
• Values are behaviors or principles setting the standard of acceptability and admirability within a society.
• The use of "po" and "opo" to elders exemplifies respect.
  • The "po" and "opo" are norms derived from the value of "pagkamagalang" or respect
• Norms prohibit laughing when someone falls, promoting considerate and helpful behavior

Society and Culture

• Society consists of people sharing the same culture.
• Culture embodies the way of life of a certain society
• Society and Culture coexist and are interdependent

Culture Classifications

• Material culture refers to tangible objects like clothes and tools.
• Nonmaterial culture refers to intangible aspects like beliefs, language, and norms

Socialization

• Socialization is a lifelong process of learning, teaching, internalizing, and living the culture of a society.
• Status and roles influence an individual's concept of self.
• Status is a person's position in society, either inherited/ascribed at birth or achieved.

Social Institutions

• Sets of ideas, norms, practices, or mechanisms organized and focusses on addressing the needs of the community
• Family/Kinship is the most basic social institution organizing society via familial ties based on blood relation, marriage, or social connections.
  • Family is a miniature society where one learns to relate to the outside world.
• Economics/Market systems regulate resource flow and prices to ensure fair competition and equitable access to goods/services.
• Politics/Government involves organizations ensuring peace and order by legitimizing power
• Education/School transmits knowledge and culture across generations, safeguarding continuity or instigating social change.
  • School significantly forms the mindset of an individual of being in education for almost 20 years
• Religion/Church comprises practices, symbols, and beliefs regarding the supernatural, offering explanations, meaning, purpose, and continuity.

George Herbert Mead and Symbolic Interactionism

• The self is created, developed, and changed through human interaction to form social products
• Mead was an American philosopher, sociologist, and psychologist.
• Mead is a founder of social psychology and the American sociological tradition.
• Mead is known for his theory of self.

Mead's three reasons

• Sociocultural context affects who we are, even our choices
• Others are needed to affirm and reinforce who we think we are to serve as reference points for identity.
• Culturally important things affect what a person deems as personally important

Stages of Self-Formation

• Preparatory Stage: children imitate behaviors dependent on social interaction.
• Play Stage: Children begin role-playing, forming communication and social relationships.
• Game Stage: Children, around eight or nine, do more than role-take by responding to multiple members in their environment.

Ruth Benedict and Margaret Mead

• Personality is dependent on cultural practices and socialization.
• Studying a person's personality provides insights into their upbringing.
• Personal development, mainly gender roles and other character traits, is based on cultural expectations rather than biology
• Individuals have a choice and are not passive recipients of cultural expectations

Clifford Geertz

• An anthropology professor at the University of Chicago, who studied the conception of the self.
• Culture is symbols with meanings, communicated, and negotiated to make sense of lives.
• His writings include “The Impact of the Concept of Culture on the Concept of Man” (1966) in his fieldwork at Java, Bali, and Morrocco.